Man Forever and So Percussion to fill Louie's with the sound of drums

KALAMAZOO, MI -- It could be drumming, it could be a force of nature, or both, when Man Forever and So Percussion join forces at Louie's Trophy House Grill on July 11.

Man Forever (John Colpitts, fourth from left) with So Percussion. They will perform Colpitts' percussion work from his album "Ryonen" at Louie's Trophy House Grill July 11.Alex Nathanson

"It's really overwhelming ... it's like being next to a waterfall," John Colpitts said of the experience, from a tour stop in Knoxville, Tenn.

He's inside the waterfall. Colpitts is known as Man Forever, and is also known as Kid Millions, founding member of unclassifiable Brooklyn band Oneida. He has also been a guest drummer for many groups from Yo La Tengo to Japanese noise band Boredoms.

Yoshimi, drummer for the Boredoms, said of him in a New York Times profile, "He has a very special way of playing drums, as if he were guzzling something very tasty."

"I guess so! Whatever that means," Colpitts said. "People do comment on my facial expressions. I don't have a ton of control, unfortunately."

Colpitts puts all of his bodily control into his drumming. He's a little obsessive about it. "There are a lot of expressive possibilities in drums that can happen just beyond rhythm."

In 2010 Colpitts put his drive to do more with percussion into his Man Forever project. For its third album, "Ryonen" (2014, Thrill Jockey), Colpitts teamed with avant garde classical ensemble So Percussion. So performed for a Fontana Chamber Arts concert at WMU in 2011.

If You Go

It's not "just going to be just a bunch of stuff banging away," Colpitts said. The work is "very rhythmic based, but there's a tuning component that might surprise people." He and So will be on tuned drums, which generate resonances that they'll harmonize with through vocal chants.

He carefully tunes the drums, but often, "you whack the drum and it goes out of tune." His compositions can last 20-30 minutes, with players following different time signatures. For his piece "The Clear Realization," he said, "the snare drum is in five, the bongo parts are in thirteen, I'm playing in kind of a nine but I change it up. And there's singing ... If you listen to somebody else, you can trip yourself up. But you do need to be aware of it."

If all goes well, "you reach a state where you rise above all the different patterns, and you're just aware of them going on."

"It's not just tiring, it's a challenge mentally to be able to actually believe you can do it, and push through -- I might skip a note or drop a drumstick. I have to be present for that 20 or 30 minutes" he said.

"It's like facing fear, and trying to not criticize my performance when it's happening, just be in the moment. Execute everything in a really intentioned way that will communicate some of that energy to the audience."

There's a reason he hasn't performed this material with So live more than a couple times. "I'm worried there will come a time when I'm really aware of how hard it will be before I get on stage, and I'll psych myself out. But until then, I'm moving forward with it."